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This thread is locked; no one can reply to it.
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| World's first warm blooded fish discovered! |
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Chris Katko
Member #1,881
January 2002
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Quote: It’s one of the most basic biology facts we’re taught in school growing up: Birds and mammals are warm-blooded, while reptiles, amphibians and fish are cold-blooded. But new research is turning this well-known knowledge on its head with the discovery of the world’s first warm-blooded fish — the opah. In a paper published today in Science, researchers from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) describe the unique mechanism that enables the opah, a deepwater predatory fish, to keep its body warm. The secret lies in a specially designed set of blood vessels in the fish’s gills, which allows the fish to circle warm blood throughout its entire body.
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Mark Oates
Member #1,146
March 2001
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I think my next release will be called "Ostentatious Opah" -- |
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Striker
Member #10,701
February 2009
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In german the word "Opa" means "Grandfather". Opah [Lampris guttatus], german "Gotteslachs", in English "Gods Salmon"
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Gideon Weems
Member #3,925
October 2003
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Chris Katko
Member #1,881
January 2002
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I recently watched a Futurama non-canon episode where the professor orders a super lens, uses it to zoom to the smallest piece that makes up matter. Everything is in retro pixel graphics, so the final zoom is just that, a pixel. He quickly writes up a "grand unified theory of everything" and realizes that by extension, he has solved all questions of the universe and science. He then ends up at the Nobel Price ceremony as he is handed a medal that says "Last Nobel Peace Price." It's at that point he realizes all life, as a scientist now has no meaning and is completely broken by the idea. Luckily, the episode ends with him realizing he can ask the question "Why the fundamental laws are the way they are." and it will likely take far longer than his life, so he begins his new quest. -----sig: |
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Striker
Member #10,701
February 2009
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Really?
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Johan Halmén
Member #1,550
September 2001
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Gideon Weems said: we tend to think of knowledge in absolute, final terms. We also tend to think that all classes are real classes, even though most of them are only defined by man. Mammals and birds and fish are probably very distinctive existing classes, but warm and cold blooded are probably more man made classes, especially if you have to measure temperature differencies. Planets and miniplanets are man made classes, too. Compare Jupiter, Earth and Pluto. Jupiter is a giant planet, but it's still a planet. Pluto is a mini planet, but it's not a planet. Or did they re-define it again? ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Years of thorough research have revealed that what people find beautiful about the Mandelbrot set is not the set itself, but all the rest. |
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Gideon Weems
Member #3,925
October 2003
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That reminds me of something my science teacher once told the class: "There's no such thing as cold, only the absence of heat." To put it more accurately, there is only heat, and human beings measure it in a way that meshes with our interpretation of the natural world. Still, the teacher blew my young mind that day. |
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Striker
Member #10,701
February 2009
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My chemistry teacher, Mr. Vogel, once teached us "Dirt is matter in the wrong place."
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Johan Halmén
Member #1,550
September 2001
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Gideon Weems said: "There's no such thing as cold, only the absence of heat." What qualities should "cold" possess so that it could be called "an existing thing"? More and more I find these kind of statements stupid. They are a good way of making people think, but when you're done with the thinking, you can always response with a question like mine. "There's no thing as colours. It's just a continuum of different wave lengths of light." "There's no thing as sound, if no one is there to hear it." "There's no thing as a centrifugal force." "Cold" is a thing as much as "shadow". Go tell a shadow theatre ensemble "Sorry, guys, but shadows don't actually exist". ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Years of thorough research have revealed that what people find beautiful about the Mandelbrot set is not the set itself, but all the rest. |
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Ben Delacob
Member #6,141
August 2005
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Johan Halmén said: "Cold" is a thing as much as "shadow". Go tell a shadow theatre ensemble "Sorry, guys, but shadows don't actually exist". Accept R'hllor as the one true god!* I had a chemistry professor say the same thing. It's quite true in some scientific sense but he acted as though the common use was wrong. I felt like it was a physics professor saying I can't "go to work" because "work" has a meaning in physics. Of course, in the case of "cold", you get into a more theoretical side of science and realize that the terms used are simply placeholders for things meeting expectations in experiment. In that perspective, the absence of, say, an electron is as much a thing as the presence of one. Both perspectives are useful though. * Game of Thrones reference, IYDK __________________________________ |
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Gideon Weems
Member #3,925
October 2003
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Johan Halmén said: What qualities should "cold" possess so that it could be called "an existing thing"? I'd say exclusive encapsulation of an observed law of nature, in this case. Either cold or heat may be things, but not both. You're right about shadows and colors not standing on their own, either. Variation among cultures' vocabularies supports this. (Green traffic lights and vegetables are "blue" in parts of Asia, et cetera.) Like Ben says, such rigid definitions should not be applied to everyday conversation, unless you want people to think you're weird. |
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type568
Member #8,381
March 2007
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Someone wants to make some noise and a name. Tuna's hot blooded too then. And it tastes not like fish, nor like meat. It tastes like something in the middle, I love it. Yes to heats up in warmer water before diving in to cooler waters, but it also has the heat exchange system with it's blood to preserve heat the fatter boy does. Just the fatter boy is more efficient cos' he's a damn balloon.
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Johan Halmén
Member #1,550
September 2001
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Silence is a thing. Vacuum is a thing. This leads to a question that has been nagging me and it has been debatted before. When people are talking about the size of the Universe, which of these statements would be most correct:
If only 1 or 2 are correct, we have one more non-existent thing, space. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Years of thorough research have revealed that what people find beautiful about the Mandelbrot set is not the set itself, but all the rest. |
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Striker
Member #10,701
February 2009
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Have you ever tried to imagine light speed? It's impossible. In the same moment you turn on the light it's gone thousands of kilometers far... The same you can't imagine a light year or a gigaparsec. Its beyond our imagination. For mankind now the universe is as big as the biggest telescopes can reach. And so far there ist no end in sight. 
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Mark Oates
Member #1,146
March 2001
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My understanding was that light is not actually traveling. Rather, space is warping around light... or... spacetime is expressing the light's speed with latency. I'm trying to find the right words here. The "speed of light" is actually the terminal velocity permitted by spacetime - light would otherwise travel instantaneously from one location to the next. That is to say "speed of light" is a bit of a misnomer where "cosmic speed limit" is more accurate. -- |
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Striker
Member #10,701
February 2009
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Recently they have found that light has two aspects: - wave, where particles push each other transporting an impulse
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LennyLen
Member #5,313
December 2004
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Striker said: Recently they have found that light has two aspects: Recently? We were taught that in high school over two decades ago.
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Striker
Member #10,701
February 2009
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Time quickly goes by these days...
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